Fall Temps are here...for now

It's 58 degrees and sunny today and Mother Nature is showing her colors nicely. Wouldn't this make a great colorway for yarn?!

That means it's also football season and my husband and I took a drive to Collegeville, PA to watch our grandson play center for Ursinus College. The Bears beat Muhlenberg 17-7, a team that has beat them 23 times out of the last 27 games so there was excitement throughout the game.

I captured some cute fungi on my recent walks around the hood...

there is something about mushrooms that I find curious.

I don't know what it is. Maybe my imagination leads me to tell stories 

about little elves that live under them. 😄

On to the knitting portion of today's entry. My photographer was golfing so I had to rig a way to use the self timer. Everyone managed to squeeze into the photo. We talked about how much fun we had last week at our private showing and dyeing with Terri at Whole Knit n' Caboodle.

The ladies who dyed yarn brought them in today. Tina is tossing ideas in the air for which pattern to use. One of the ideas was the Leftie by Martina Behm but she's open to suggestions. She strategically added a little dribble of brown dye to the green base for a pretty heathered result.

Margaret likes a good burnt orange/rust color and Terri mixed it just right for her.

Carole wanted a blue with dots of deep red. The denim blue color will look great with jeans.

And Barbara B already knitted up her deep blue yarn into the Blue Wave Hat with secret Morse code messages knitted around.

She adapted the pattern to make it a little longer to cover her ears.

Carole finished her Trellis Hat but is not wanting to rush the cold weather too soon.

On our way to Pennsylvania last Friday we passed a cute little house that my husband asked me if I wanted to stop to check out the yarn store inside. He looks out for me! I saw a sample knit of the Cityscape Cowl that called for a fingering weight yarn held together with a mohair. It just so happens that last week when I was hunting for something else in the stash, I came across these two yarns and knew they would be perfect for this cowl!

I started it Sunday night but it's not a good social knitting pattern so it is reserved for when I'm alone.

This afternoon I added a pattern repeat to Benjamin Matthews' Twistful Beanie. I can't say it's a pattern for the faint of heart because on round 4 two stitches are slipped off the needle and left in thin air while two others are knitted and the two floating stitches are then knitted back on to the needle. It's a great pattern once you bite the bullet and see that it's not as difficult as it sounds.

Carole wanted to start a couple of good car ride knitting projects so this One Row Handspun Scarf pattern from Stephanie Pearl McPhee is perfect for long drives.

Barbara B has about three more weeks to finish her Easy Vivi Wrap so she can wear it to a wedding. She's fast approaching the finish line.

Jan bought this pretty purple yarn at Whole Knit n' Caboodle last week and dove right into her 

Vacation Shawl, a free pattern on Ravelry that uses DK weight yarn.

Tina saw this bandana cowl and had the perfect yarns in mind for it!

Knit Picks has a line called Chroma that has the prettiest gradient colors! This is going to be fabulous!

Maureen finished her toy vehicles blanket and is waiting to block it. In the meantime,

she has started a diagonal baby blanket.

Margaret has a pretty hand dyed variegated yarn to make the 1898 Hat. 

Nancy's Windripple Shawl is much deeper that it was last week. It's going to be beautiful!

Fozzie was begging while we tried to knit so I had to distract him with his puzzle toy. It's great that some paper towel tubes and a little hot glue can keep him distracted and out of everybody's knitting bag. He thinks he's the official inspector when he sees a bag on the floor. LOL!

I'm off to cook dinner. We're having my Italian grandmother's roasted sweet Italian sausage and potatoes. She used to cook it in a gigantic cast iron pan on the charcoal grill when we had cookouts so I had to adapt the recipe for the oven but it tastes like I remember.

Have a great week and keep those needles clicking!

It's not raining today...

But the humidity and heat on the deck was just too much for a normal human being to tolerate so we stayed inside where it was cool. Fozzie made the rounds to check everyone's bag for contraband. Or maybe it was cookies. Yeah, most likely cookies.

And there were cookies just not the kind kitties can eat. Barbara B's treat today was sourdough strawberry cookies. I'm saving mine for an after dinner treat but I'm sure they were delicious by the sounds of satisfaction from Carole as she sampled one.

We have some FOs this week. Nancy completed her Leaded Lights Cowl which uses slipped stitches to achieve this lovely pattern.

Barbara B finished her Hot Springs Willow Hat with the wide faux cables. Like our favorite Benjamin Matthews hat patterns, Shelby Nichols designs interesting hats patterns that are well written and easy to follow.

She also took the yarn that Margaret gave her last week and finished another hat called Barley Hat from Tin Can Knits. 

Jan finished her cabled hat and had a skein and a half of this Irish yarn left which also went to Barbara B. So I suspect we'll see another of her hats next week. 

I completed the scarf from Susen Mehralieva's YouTube video. I used Plymouth Yarns Royal Bamboo yarn, one of the loveliest bamboo yarns. Unfortunately, it has been discontinued. The Chicks wanted to know how to knit this so I wrote a pattern for those who like to read what they're knitting as opposed to following the process on video. We talked about doing a KAL to test knit my write-up so keep an eye to the future for possibly more of these scarves.

I started another one this weekend for myself using Crystal Palace Mini Mochi yarn, my all time favorite for gradient colors. Sadly, it too has been discontinued.😢

Jan started the Loop Hat using a great denim blue colored yarn.

And as it turns out, Carole has the same pattern on her needles. She's a little further along and will probably be finished soon.

For my Falcon Boutique at Albany High School project, I started another ZickZack Scarf with an orphan skein of sock yarn. This is going to be a cowl with a provisional cast on (yellow yarn) so I can graft the live edges together into a big infinity scarf. I made one already with this yarn but it is smaller, more of a headband for keeping ears warm.

Margaret, who is always trying to convince us she's not an experienced or skilled knitter, has just designed another hat to use up small scraps of yarn! We laughed when she said, "It was easy, just do this and this" because that's what I always say and I get looks of doubt every single time. LOL!

Barbara B has just started an 1898 Hat. If you've never knitted one, it's fun because it has an out of the ordinary process. You knit the ear flaps and cuff first, fold it in half, pick up stitches from the edge, and knit the crown. Because 5" of the cuff is knitted by the time you start the crown, it makes it feel like the hat is flying off your needles and you're finished in no time!

Benjamin Matthews offered a brand new pattern for free for a limited time so we all grabbed a copy and Nancy is the first to start the Laguna Drift Beanie. The ribbing has a neat pronounced appearance because the knits stitches are knitted through the back loop giving it a twist.

That about wraps it up for this week. 

Hope you have a great week ahead and keep those needles clicking!

Is it going to rain EVERY TUESDAY?!?!

Someone asked who watched the World Cup Finals and Dorah started a whole conversation just by saying it was boring! Then I chimed in that it couldn't be any more boring than football. So if my grandson's ears were burning today, I'll know why. 😄 And as what usually happens, the topic changed to food and somehow we were wondering who was the first person to look at an oyster, lobsters, and alligators and think, "Gee! That looks like something I could eat." It's a good thing Barbara B makes delicious sourdough treats for us!

 We had strawberry-chocolate chip-sourdough muffins today. Mine hit the spot just right.

There were a few FOs to add to the inventory. My 100 Colors Cowl on which I knitted last week is finished. I used a Wonderland Yarn for the solid gray and Lang Super Soxx for the variegated. It is a little subdued for my taste but not everyone has the same taste so I try to knit outside my comfort zone now and then.

Dorah's Workday Scarf is ready for the inventory and it is beautiful! 

The colors are like a summer sunset.

Maureen finished her Through the Forest Hat using a yarn that was gifted to her. It is a merino and polyamide blend so it's machine washable.

Barbara B finished the Trellis Hat which looks like a gender neutral pattern. I couldn't find the pattern on Ravelry so maybe Barbara B can leave a link in the comments section.

Her String of Lights socks are finished too. They look beautiful and her stitch definition is perfection!

Tina finished her hat from last week. The pattern was from a book. Did I get the name? NO!😖

But I got the name of the hat and a picture from the book. Gotta give me a little credit. When I asked for the name of the hat pattern, Maureen said it's the "Don't talk to me while I'm knitting" hat! Yeah, I have a bunch of patterns like that. 😉

I followed this video to knit this designer's variation on a Sophie Scarf. Susen Mehralieva has a collection of scarf patterns that follow the same basic shape of the Sophie Scarf but she adds her own little bit of spice with cables, lace, and various other patterns to change up a plain garter stitch scarf. Check her out on YouTube. I'm using Plymouth Royal Bamboo Yarn, a fabulous fiber which unfortunately has been discontinued. It has an amazing drape and weight and the luster is lovely.

Dorah took the leftover yarn from a previous project and added a solid navy blue to make her favorite Helix Hat.

And Barbara K is starting the 5" of ribbing for her hat.

Margaret closed the cuff of her 1898 Hat and is on to knitting the crown.

Maureen started a Shelby Nichols pattern called Celtic Feather. 

Her patterns are well written and easy to follow.

Tina started another hat, the pattern she found on YouTube. It begins with a moebius band which is bound off and stitches are then picked up to knit the crown. It is knitted with two strands of yarn and has twisted braids in the design of the crown.

Jan's hat is showing some of the cable work which will follow up the crown to the close at the top.

Barbara B is knitting another Shelby Nichols pattern called Hot Springs Willow Hat. It has a faux cable design up the crown.

Someone is bugging me for food so it's time for me to go.

Have a great week and keep those needles clicking!